The present invention relates to a sweetening composition having the desirable sweetness intensity and rate of solubility of sucrose without the accompanying caloric content. More specifically, this invention pertains to a sweetening composition having the above mentioned properties which comprises a dipeptide sweetener and an edible, bland, low calorie polysaccharide and the method of making the same.
It is well known that the dipeptide compounds of this invention set forth principally in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,475,403 issued Oct. 28, 1969, 3,492,131 issued Jan. 27, 1970, 3,695,898 issued Oct. 3, 1972 and more recently 3,714,139 issued Jan. 30, 1973 possess intensely sweet and low calorie properties. It has also been determined, however, that these compounds as a class have a markedly slower rate of solution than sucrose making their use in food and beverage systems impractical notwithstanding their attractiveness as low calorie sweetening compounds.
Methods for improving solubility which are known in the art could foreseeably function effectively with these compounds such as admixing the same with fumaric and/or adipic acid, incorporating a surface active agent or combining these dipeptides with certain dry bulking agents which may or may not affect their solubility. However, these compounds do not serve the purpose of this invention which is to produce a sweetening composition having not only a satisfactory rate of solubility and low calorie content, but also a "keeps well" property due to low hygroscopicity. At the same time, addition of a compound which would impart any type of aftertaste resulting in an alteration of the natural sweet properties of the dipeptide is highly undesirable and therefore a bland bulking agent would be preferred.
In the light of a great demand for new functional sweetening agents, the invention herein presented fulfills the above mentioned criteria so important from a food technological as well as consumer point of view.